Jeanne Moreau, 1928–2017

[NonP]

The French New Wave icon was 89 years old:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/31/movies/jeanne-moreau-dead.html

(I'm sure there are other remembrances worth reading but am linking to this one out of appreciation for the Gray Lady's indefatigable gang of obituary writers, the recent subjects of Vanessa Gould's fine documentary.)

Jeanne will always be remembered for her breakout role in Jules and Jim where she played the seductive, precarious, and ultimately deadly Catherine, but I daresay she grew even more beautiful as she aged. Easily one of the greatest talents in film history. She will be missed.

 

[stringertom]

The French New Wave icon was 89 years old:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/31/movies/jeanne-moreau-dead.html

(I'm sure there are other remembrances worth reading but am linking to this one out of appreciation for the Gray Lady's indefatigable gang of obituary writers, the recent subjects of Vanessa Gould's fine documentary.)

Jeanne will always be remembered for her breakout role in Jules and Jim where she played the seductive, precarious, and ultimately deadly Catherine, but I daresay she grew even more beautiful as she aged. Easily one of the greatest talents in film history. She will be missed.

America would have known her better had she not turned down the role of Mrs. Robinson in The Graduate. Anne Bancroft wasn't a bad replacement though.

RIP, a real talent in all her endeavors.

 

[Bartelby]

Associating Jeanne Moreau too closely with the new wave seems a little lazy.

 

[NonP]

America would have known her better had she not turned down the role of Mrs. Robinson in The Graduate. Anne Bancroft wasn't a bad replacement though.

RIP, a real talent in all her endeavors.

It's probably for the best that she turned down the role, given Hollywood's history of screwing older actresses (and it sure hasn't gotten much better since). Plus The Graduate is being increasingly seen as a relic of the times, IMO rightly so.

But yes, Anne sure made Dustin sweat.

Associating Jeanne Moreau too closely with the new wave seems a little lazy.

And downplaying the association would've been just as flippantly contrarian. Apart from La notte I can't think of any other film she starred in that will likely last as long as her best-known Nouvelle Vague efforts.

It's a shame Dave Kehr no longer writes for the NYT (well, not as paid staff anyway). He would've brought a much-needed historical perspective to Moreau's bio and oeuvre.

 

[Bartelby]

She was already a prominent classical actor before the wave broke and she doesn't really fit the new wave style despite it making her famous:

In 1947, Moreau made her theatrical debut at the Avignon Festival. She debuted at the Comédie-Française in Ivan Turgenev's A Month in the Country[1] and, by her twenties, was already one of leading actresses in the theatre's troupe.[3] After 1949, she began appearing in films with small parts but continued primarily active in the theatre for several years—a year at the Théâtre National Populaire opposite among others Gérard Philipe and Robert Hirsch, then a breakout two years in dual roles in The Dazzling Hour by Anna Bonacci, then Jean Cocteau's La Machine Infernale and others before another two-year run, this time in Shaw's Pygmalion.[1] From the late 1950s, after appearing in several successful films, she began to work with the emerging generation of French film-makers. Elevator to the Gallows (1958) with first-time director Louis Malle was followed by Malle's The Lovers (Les Amants, 1959).[6]

Largely thanks to these films, Moreau went on to work with many of the best known New Wave and avant-garde directors.[3] François Truffaut's New Wave film Jules et Jim (1962), her biggest success internationally, is centred on her magnetic starring role.[3] She also worked with a number of other notable directors such as Michelangelo Antonioni (La notte and Beyond the Clouds), Orson Welles (The Trial, Chimes at Midnight and The Immortal Story), Luis Buñuel (Diary of a Chambermaid), Elia Kazan (The Last Tycoon), Rainer Werner Fassbinder (Querelle), Wim Wenders (Until the End of the World), Carl Foreman (Champion and The Victors), and Manoel de Oliveira (Gebo et l'Ombre).

 

[ojo rojo]

 

[NonP]

She was already a prominent classical actor before the wave broke and she doesn't really fit the new wave style despite it making her famous:

In 1947, Moreau made her theatrical debut at the Avignon Festival. She debuted at the Comédie-Française in Ivan Turgenev's A Month in the Country[1] and, by her twenties, was already one of leading actresses in the theatre's troupe.[3] After 1949, she began appearing in films with small parts but continued primarily active in the theatre for several years—a year at the Théâtre National Populaire opposite among others Gérard Philipe and Robert Hirsch, then a breakout two years in dual roles in The Dazzling Hour by Anna Bonacci, then Jean Cocteau's La Machine Infernale and others before another two-year run, this time in Shaw's Pygmalion.[1] From the late 1950s, after appearing in several successful films, she began to work with the emerging generation of French film-makers. Elevator to the Gallows (1958) with first-time director Louis Malle was followed by Malle's The Lovers (Les Amants, 1959).[6]

Largely thanks to these films, Moreau went on to work with many of the best known New Wave and avant-garde directors.[3] François Truffaut's New Wave film Jules et Jim (1962), her biggest success internationally, is centred on her magnetic starring role.[3] She also worked with a number of other notable directors such as Michelangelo Antonioni (La notte and Beyond the Clouds), Orson Welles (The Trial, Chimes at Midnight and The Immortal Story), Luis Buñuel (Diary of a Chambermaid), Elia Kazan (The Last Tycoon), Rainer Werner Fassbinder (Querelle), Wim Wenders (Until the End of the World), Carl Foreman (Champion and The Victors), and Manoel de Oliveira (Gebo et l'Ombre).

FYI those Malle films "fit the new wave style" as well as Jules and Jim. Nobody was saying she did nothing else before or after. When you admit it's these roles that made her famous why keep splitting hairs?

Wish I caught at least one of her theater performances. It's quite interesting how some of the greatest film actors don't transition that well to theater and vice versa. A couple years ago I saw Juliette Binoche in Ivo van Hove's Antigone production at the Kennedy Center (guess which role she played) and she was disappointing to put it mildly. (Though TBF the whole thing was a debacle on almost all counts - Kirsty Bushell's Ismene is the only positive thing I can think of.) It was as if she didn't know or care that on stage one cannot rely on small gestures only, not to mention she was barely audible most of the time.

I gather Jeanne had no such issues given her theater background, but maybe a lifetime of toiling in front of the camera did spoil her in the end.

 

[ollinger]

Anne Bancroft wasn't a bad replacement though

.....except for her legs, apparently. The famous poster photo of Hoffman seen gazing at those crossed legs was made using a "leg double."

 

[Bartelby]

Louis Malle somewhat fits the new wave label, just as Jeanne Moreau somewhat intersected with the movement:

Malle is sometimes associated with the nouvelle vague movement. Malle's work does not directly fit in with or correspond to the auteurist theories that apply to the work of Godard, Truffaut, Chabrol, Rohmer and others, and he had nothing whatsoever to do with the Cahiers du cinéma. However, it does exemplify many of the characteristics of the movement, such as using natural light and shooting on location ...

FYI those Malle films "fit the new wave style" as well as Jules and Jim. Nobody was saying she did nothing else before or after. When you admit it's these roles that made her famous why keep splitting hairs?

Wish I caught at least one of her theater performances. It's quite interesting how some of the greatest film actors don't transition that well to theater and vice versa. A couple years ago I saw Juliette Binoche in Ivo van Hove's Antigone production at the Kennedy Center (guess which role she played) and she was disappointing to put it mildly. (Though TBF the whole thing was a debacle on almost all counts - Kirsty Bushell's Ismene is the only positive thing I can think of.) It was as if she didn't know or care that on stage one cannot rely on small gestures only, not to mention she was barely audible most of the time.

I gather Jeanne had no such issues given her theater background, but maybe a lifetime of toiling in front of the camera did spoil her in the end.